Our Monmouth Blog

I’m a sloppy barbecue chef. Nothing draws the flavor of hops out of an import than a sirloin that’s been marinating for twelve hours. Once on the grill I continue to apply a liberal smothering of steak sauce.

Or as Winnie the Pooh would interject – smackeral, Piglet.

All that tangy, salty liquid flashes and splashes into the guts of the grill. Neil Young was right: Rust never sleeps. Now I have replaced the burners and jets of a few barbecues in my attempt to reduce suburban waste. If diapers do not decompose in landfills, will my great grandchildren be scaling the summit of a colossal mountain of Weber and Coleman cast-iron cookware?

The old barbecue just ain’t what she used to be. So yesterday I shot her. The Missus issued a simple command: Go buy a new barbecue.

I like to frequent Mom-and-Pop hardware stores. Hire the little guy. Invest in the local economy instead of shipping my cash southward on the Turnpike to some corporate headquarters in Delaware.

For years I’ve patronized Becker Family’s Hardware on Route 34 in Colts Neck. As a Realtor® getting keys cut is a weekly occurrence. My man Jerry cuts a mean stencil of Schlage aluminum. Pat is always courteous and quick to assist.

But at six o’clock in the evening I found myself meandering towards … one of those Conglomerate Big Box home improvement airplane hangars.

Disclaimer: Should I identify this public traded company? I mean, whose going to file a legal action against a consumer blogging a complaint? How about Freedom of Speech (while the Congress approves massive wire-tapping and privacy invasion)? Pass.]

Beckers closes at five. I’m not a conglomerate “homer.” Probably because the corporate borg undermines American manufacturing and disenfranchises competition. No. I believe the Big Box retail concept reduces me and my money to Small Shopper Status.

I walked into the store and approached a young male employee loitering amongst the young female cashiers, strutting his denim overall’d self. The Lion King meets Clerks.

“Excuse me,” I interrupted.

Immediately the young man turned around, entered my personal space and boomed, “WE DON’T HAVE ANY!” directly into my face. He closed with a smirk and half-sinister chuckle.

“Is this boy impaired?” I asked myself. I was twenty years old once. I remember trying to impress young women. I was so startled that I didn’t hear his condescending apology.

“Dude, you know I’m just fooling with you.”

He cleared his throat and tried desperately to recall his corporate Customer Service training.

“How can – er, may – I help you?” Props for conjugating the verb correctly.

I grumbled and walked away. Even my knees creaked. Truth be told, I sloughed away like a grumpy old man. I just wasn’t in the mood to serve as fodder for adolescent lust. Probably because I’m no longer an adolescent and at my age lust is scheduled between oil changes and Graduation Parties. The lad was rude or crazy. Is this the mental state of service?

Rust never sleeps in an old barbecue and apparently lust never sleeps in department stores. The Customer Service desk politely asked me to return outside to the grill section and assistance would arrive shortly.

Assistance appeared as – you guessed it — my favorite playa.

“I’m sorry about before. I can get someone else to help you,” Don Juan DeWalt sheepishly and rationally offered.

“You’ll do,” I countered, not realizing until later that I subconsciously tossed out the last line from Babe the Pig. I felt both youthful and magnanimous again. The young horny squire apologized. Let’s move on. Let’s start the healing.

Besides, I was hungry.

I found a suitable grill. The young man helped load the box onto my truck. The Vice President of Human Resources would be heartened to hear he recovered adequately during the consumer’s (that’s me) shopping experience.

Yet that outburst and my subsequent embarrassment would never have happened at Becker’s Hardware. Yes, conglomerates offer wider selections and competitive pricing. There’s something to be said for the small business owner treating his patrons larger than life, however.

Next time I’ll cook my steak in the oven and wait for Mom-and-Pop to open in the morning. Or take the little woman out to eat and maybe later go parking up on the Scenic Overlook. Hubba hubba.

Andrew J Lenza is the Broker and Owner of Andrew J. Lenza Realty in Colts Neck. When Andrew isn’t writing or enjoying Monmouth County life he is serving his clients needs in the residential and commercial sectors of the market. You can visit Andrew at www.andrewlenza.com

© Copyright, 2008. Andrew J. Lenza, All Rights Reserved.

There are so many tools today to enhance your business presence. There is print advertising in magazines and trade journals. There are the multitudes of areas regarding your internet presence, which of course, can skyrocket your customer base if you know what you’re doing, or it can drain your wallet while catapulting your competition beyond your reach.
Whatever service-related business you are in, if you are dealing directly with the public, I’ll tell you, hands down, the biggest mistake that business owners make is client follow-up. I see it constantly in almost all types of businesses. Client follow-up is the most underrated, and by far, the worst executed part of the whole business process that prevents a company from reaching its full potential. After all, is business so good for you that you can afford to casually wait to respond to a request?
Case and point. You advertise on the internet, and you receive leads from some industry-specific lead program. Let’s say you get 5 leads per week from that source. Chances are, in our very hectic NJ environment, the client is just as busy as you are. In their quest to find the best service professional, he or she will try to choose the best whatever (contractor, paperhanger, website builder, and wedding singer) in the shortest time-frame. The service professional who returns the client’s call first, many times, good or bad, may be the beneficiary to that new client. That’s follow-up.
Another case and point. If you answer a request or respond to a lead, many business owners think that the potential client will (or should) return his or her call immediately if truly interested. Not so! The fact is that your potential client is so darn busy with his daily critical tasks; yours may be #12 on his list of things to do. Follow-up again!
A successful service professional must follow-up at least a few times without fail. And that sometimes means more than a few times, and that 4th or 5th call-back, email, or hand-written note sometimes closes the sale. On the other hand, you also need to keep in mind that if this repeated follow-up is not done in a professional manner, it could just turn the client off and cause him to pass you up for another professional. What can I say; life (and business) is more of an art than it is a science.
I will tell you this; if you don’t follow-up early and often, someone else will, and you’ll be short-circuiting your chances for obtaining new clients and limiting your business growth potential. You live and learn the specific techniques that work for you when following-up with potential customers. Be persistent without appearing too aggressive (or obnoxious!) and keep doing and refining those follow-up techniques until they become a science (i.e., YOUR OWN personal process).
So don’t get discouraged or taken-back by a potential client’s lack of response regarding your initial follow-up to their request. Learn to expect this in our hustle and bustle NJ environment and, no matter what, follow-up religiously the same way you would want someone else to follow-up for you to earn your business. What’s the worst that can happen? You’ll get better at the process and grow your business.

New Jersey pianist Arnie Abrams has been a professional musician and performer for over 20 years. He has provided live music for countless clients for their weddings, parties and corporate affairs throughout New Jersey, metro New York and Philadelphia.

Maryann Spoto of The Star-Ledger reported yesterday “Seven arrested in Monmouth County drug bust“.

Federal and state authorities said today they arrested seven people and dismantled an elaborate Monmouth County-based drug trafficking and money-laundering operation that each month allegedly netted $1 million and distributed more than 1,000 kilograms of cocaine.

I have driven by that house countless times. I always admired it and often wondered “what job/business/inheritance the family had”. Well now I know……

Perhaps I should not be surprised but it is kind of shocking and way too close to home.

John Cichowski of The Record recently reported “Welcome to the stupid driver state”

With the warm-weather driving season under way, GMAC Insurance has confirmed our worst suspicions: New Jersey’s 6.2 million licensed drivers are the nation’s dumbest. The big auto insurer came to this conclusion after giving an online test to 5,524 drivers from the 50 states and Washington, D.C. (gmacinsurance.com/SafeDriving). Most questions came from state driving exams.

We didn’t simply flunk this test. We came in 51st — dead last — even worse than the drivers we love to ridicule in Washington, D.C. (50th), New York (49th) and Massachusetts (48th). This failure rate is more than embarrassing. It’s historic. In the four years that GMAC has been giving these tests, no state has scored lower than 69.9 percent correct answers — our score this year.

The stupid driver state? I know that you tested a little over 5,500 people to draw this conclusion and in all fairness our Governor doesn’t wear a seat belt and almost died in an accident. Fellow New Jerseans unite and together we can overcome this label. When we rank 50 next year we can flip GMAC the bird.

I don’t know what is more embarrassing the fact that we were the worst in the nation scoring the all time lowest score or that someone actually authorized expenditure for this type of ridiculous survey. Sounds like a ploy to raise my insurance rates, what do you take me for, a fool?